GRASSROOTS/Hank Kalet

Ambivalence on the Campaign
Trail

'People who say that money is speech need
to understand if that's true, there are a lot of people in this
country that cannot be heard. Money is not speech.' -- US Rep.
Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.)

Call it step one in the fight to fix our
broken election system. But let's not pretend that the Shays-Meehan
campaign finance bill that passed the House of Representatives on
Valentine's Day is anything more than a small step, one that shows
there is some level of support for reform.

While the bill is not the panacea its
supporters have made it out to be, it does attempt to redress the
imbalances that are threatening our democracy.

The bill won with the support of 198
Democrats, 41 Republicans and Independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont
and now goes to the Senate (a Senate vote was anticipated in late
February, after this was written). It would:

 Prohibit the use of soft money by
national party committees and limit soft money contributions to state
party committees to $10,000 and could only be used for
get-out-the-vote and registration efforts.

 Set individual contribution limits of
$1,000 to House candidates, $2,000 to Senate and presidential
candidates and $30,000 to political parties. The bill also would
index the amounts for inflation.

 Restrict the ability of unions,
corporations and nonprofit groups to pay for broadcast "issue ads" if
the ads referred to a federal candidate and ran within 60 days of a
general election or 30 days of a primary. The bill would require that
the ads be paid for with hard money through a political action
committee.

The current system allows corporations and
other groups to legally funnel an unlimited amount of cash to
candidates, which runs counter to the spirit of federal election
rules and it distorts the way our democracy is supposed to
work.

The fact is, big donations buy access -- see
Enron -- the average voter does not have. That access can translate
into influence and results in a slew of legislation being passed that
does little for the average citizen but makes corporate leaders very
happy.

That makes it imperative to get this kind of
money out of the system. A ban on soft money -- if it can get through
the Senate and is signed by the president -- would be a good start,
because it will make it more difficult for donors to circumvent
contribution limits, but it will not take private money out of the
system.

First of all, there are no guarantees that
the Shays-Meehan bill will withstand the expected court challenges.
As the Washington Post pointed out in the wake of the House
vote, the bill's "main provisions -- a ban on unregulated 'soft
money' and new regulations on 'issue ads' -- are likely to be
challenged by a host of individuals and organizations as violations
of the constitutional right to free speech."

And we're not just talking about hard-core
Republican opponents. The American Civil Liberties Union has been a
long-time opponent of the bill, unions have expressed some misgivings
and state political parties and advocacy groups are concerned about
the regulations on how they raise and spend money.

I tend to agree with the ACLU argument,
especially its contention that restrictions on issue ads violate the
Constitution because they would hamper the rights of citizens or
groups to speak out. Issues are at the core of election campaigns,
the ACLU says, and to limit the rights of groups to comment on these
issues amounts to an unconstitutional infringement on their
members.

The courts, as a story in the Post
pointed out, have backed the ACLU up on this one. The Supreme Court,
the Post wrote, ruled in 1976 in Buckley v. Valeo "that
Congress could not regulate fundraising or spending with respect to
independent issue advertising unless the ads expressly advocate a
particular electoral outcome with phrases such as 'vote for' or 'vote
against.'"

At the same time, however, I agree with
supporters of the Shays-Meehan bill who say that the current court
standard has allowed private groups and parties to spend huge amounts
of cash on ads designed to sway voters -- without admitting that the
ads are campaign ads. This, they say, violates the spirit of the
Buckley decision.

Of course, issue ads have become a charade.
Much of what passed for political advertising during the final weeks
of the 2000 election ended with this type of tagline: "Tell Rush Holt
to stop raising taxes" or "Tell Mike Ferguson to leave a woman's
right to choose alone."

What we need is a voluntary system of full
public financing that would give money and free TV time to qualified
candidates provided they forgo or severely limit the amount of
private contributions they take in. Candidates could opt out, but
would have to explain to voters why taking money from the private
sector was more important to them than participating in the public
finance system.

Elections are integral to a functioning
democracy and, as such, need to be paid for with public money. We can
no longer leave the funding of our elections to donors who are
looking for a return on their dollars.

Hank Kalet is a poet and managing editor
of The South Brunswick Post and The
Cranbury Press. He can be reached via e-mail at
grassroots@comcast.net.